4,999 White Mice
by HebrewPrincess91
Summary: Picture day is coming up and Remus is resigned to the fact that this year's picture will look just as bad as the previous six. But, James, Sirius, and Peter have other plans. Plans that include candy, mice, and a little magic. Marauders' Era. One-shot. Canon compliant.


It was that time of year once again, the days were longer, the air was hotter, and final exams were bearing down on students at an alarming rate. Yes, it was the end of spring and the beginning of summer at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. It was also the time of year for yearbook photos to be taken.

Peter stopped in the common room to look at the newly published sign adorning the bulletin board. James saw him perusing the sign and asked, "Anything interesting up there Wormtail?"

"Yeah," said Peter, "Saturday the fifteenth is picture day for the yearbook, they'll be taking pictures right after breakfast in the great hall."

"Nice," said Sirius joining the conversation, "do they want us to wear anything specific or can we actually chose for once?"

"The sign says that 'all students are required to have their picture taken for the yearbook and must wear their school uniform.'" Peter said, reading off of the notice. "And that if they don't 'there will be consequences.'"

"What do you want to bet McGonagall had something to do with writing the notice?" Sirius said to James.

"Nothing," James responded. "'There will be consequences' has McGonagall written all over it, she's such a killjoy."

"You know," said Peter, "there never used to be guidelines or threats on these notices until you did that thing in fourth year, I guess McGonagall doesn't want you to get creative again."

Sirius and James chortled at the memory of the event. "Yeah, I almost forgot we did that," Sirius said, "that was great."

"Well," said James, jumping up on one the ottomans in the room causing some people to look at him. "This year the Marauders are going to have the best yearbook photos in the history of yearbook photos." As he said this he threw his arm in the air and struck a heroic pose. "You know what this means, men? It means it's time to break out the pimple cream, get ourselves the best haircuts and have the elves wash our best robes!"

"And," said Peter, jumping up on the seat of a chair and struggling to keep his balance on the lumpy cushions. "Remember to shave the day of!"

"Yeah, that too," said James keeping up his pose and trying to look noble.

"And," said Sirius, as he hooked his foot around one of the legs of James' ottoman. "Using lots of bruise cream!" As he said this he swept his foot around causing the ottoman to fall over and sending James into a heap on the floor.

"Yeah, that too," said Peter as giggles erupted around the common room at James' tumble.

James straightened himself out glaring at Sirius, Sirius smirked with a challenge in his eyes. James silently accepted the challenge and abruptly yelled, "Death to the traitor!" As he began to clobber Sirius with a nearby throw pillow. Within seconds the two of them were going at it hammer and tongs beating each other with pillows and enjoying every minute of it, until…

"James Potter!"

The two boys stopped thrashing each other to see Lily Evens cross the threshold into the common room. She was followed by Remus and a few other Gryffindors.

"James," she continued, "you are Head Boy! What kind of example are you setting for the younger students?"

"What do I care?" answered James, "I won't be here next year and I won't have to put up with them, they can be as horrible as they please."

Lily rolled her eyes, sure James could be great as a boyfriend, but never in a million years would she understand why Dumbledore had made him Head Boy.

"Just try to act like a grown-up for a little longer." She knew her plea was just a waste of her breath, it was too near the end of the year for James to contain himself any longer.

Remus went over to look at the new notice on the board, as his eyes landed on the date for the pictures he groaned. "What?" said Peter, who recognized the groan as the same one Remus would give whenever he felt that life wasn't being fair to him – he gave it a lot.

"Nothing," Remus mumbled, but he gave Peter a significant look while saying it.

Sirius noticed this and shouted, "Last one to the dorm is a troll's mother!" and dashed toward the dorm.

The others pelted after him. Remus, being furthest away from the staircase at the time of Sirius' declaration was awarded the dubious honor of being a troll's mother as he entered the dorm he shared with his three friends.

"So, Mrs. Troll," said James, "what was the my-life-is-so-not-fair-and-the-world-hates-me groan about?"

"The pictures for the yearbook, they're being taken on Saturday," Remus answered, groaning again.

The others looked at him blankly, not sure what he was getting at.

"Saturday," Remus said again.

More blank looks.

"This Saturday."

Continued staring.

"This Saturday," Remus said again pointing to his calendar that had all the moon phases clearly marked out. Friday was circled and a prominent full moon symbol was displayed.

"Oh." The three of them chorused at once as they looked at the calendar.

"You'll have just spent all night as a werewolf," said Peter pointedly.

"You won't be back until later on Saturday morning," said James thoughtfully.

"You'll look like crap if you get your picture taken on Saturday," said Sirius harshly, "just like all the other years. They always plan picture day near the full moon and you always look like crap."

"Now you see why I groaned?" said Remus, "It's always like this, it's like Hogwarts does this on purpose, it's not fair. The rest of you will look great, and I look like I got on the wrong side of house elf who thought I was trying to give it clothes."

The other three boys looked at each other thoughtfully, there had to be a way for Remus to get at least one good yearbook photo.

"Well, we could talk to McGonagall. Maybe she'll change the day for the pictures?" suggested Peter.

"No," said Sirius, "what do we say when she asks us why?"

"That Moony will be sick?" said Peter.

"She'll just say to take him to the hospital wing," said James. "That's what she's always said in the past."

"Maybe Remus could ask Dumbledore to move it?" said Peter again.

"And what will he say to the yearbook committee when they complain? That Saturday is a bad horoscope for taking pictures?" Sirius said, squashing any idea of taking this through the chain of command.

James, too, didn't think they would get very far by asking for the date to be changed for no reason. "We'll just have to force the yearbook committee to change the date."

"Are we going to threaten them?" asked Sirius, lighting up a bit.

"Not exactly what I had in mind," said James, "I was thinking a small catastrophe could happen on the day of the pictures forcing them to reschedule in a week or two."

Remus, Peter and Sirius leaned in to hear more.

* * *

Saturday dawned bright and clear. The day was perfect for taking pictures. There was plenty of natural light in the great hall, the humidity was low so people's hair wasn't an issue, and the day was just the right temperature.

Lily and the rest of the yearbook committee had finished breakfast early in order to being setting things up for the photos. A professional photographer had been brought in to ensure that everything would be perfect. Lily was so excited, this would be one of the last things she did at Hogwarts and she wanted everything to run smoothly.

"Melissa, make sure that the first years know where to stand, and make sure they are separate from the second years, Tom, when people start lining up make sure they are wearing the right robes, and make sure there aren't any stains or other things that would look bad on them." And off she went, organizing, directing and getting things done.

Outside in the entrance hall James, Sirius and Peter stood, waiting for the right moment. Between James and Sirius was a wheelbarrow filled with bags of Skittles.

James checked his watch then said "Okay, Wormtail, open the Skittles."

Peter waved his wand and one by one the bags of Skittles opened and the contents were poured out onto the floor. When there was a sizable heap on the floor and the wheelbarrow was empty James and Sirius nodded at each other.

"On three," said Sirius.

"One," said James.

"Two," said Sirius.

"Three!" said Peter.

At Peter's word James and Sirius waved their wands and the pile of Skittles burst into a seething mass of squeaking white mice. At another wave of their wands the mice ran forward into the great hall.

To say that what followed was a catastrophe might be an overstatement, however, the mice did wreak havoc. The charmed mice ran up people's legs, into people's pockets and were virtually unstoppable. The mice stampeded through the great hall, tiny feet were everywhere. James, Sirius and Peter came into the hall just to see the devastation caused by the tiny writhing bodies.

"Look," said James, "one of the mice is red."

In the midst of the white mass one candy red mouse could be occasionally glimpsed.

"Dibs!" shouted Sirius, and he plunged into the mass of mice trying to grab the little red Skittles mouse.

Lily tried wading through the confusion, but it was hopeless. First years were crying, second years were screaming and she was pretty sure she saw some of the teachers dive for cover. "Whoever did this will be sorry," she growled under her breath, "they will pay for disrupting picture day."

Dumbledore forged his way through the mice into the center of the hall. "Who is responsible for this?" His voice boomed out over the confusion, obviously magically enhanced.

James and Sirius stepped forward to claim their infamy. Dumbledore looked at them in that piercing way of his and said, "Stop this chaos at once."

The boys nodded, not even looking ashamed. They raised their wands waved them. A second later all of the mice (except for the red one) un-transfigured and fell to the ground in their normal Skittle form.

An eerie silence swept over the hall as the squeaking ceased. There were still a few of the younger students crying but for the most part the screaming and stomping and yelling ceased. Skittles were everywhere.

Lily stomped over to where the boys were standing cheerfully in front of Dumbledore. Some were giving the two of them looks of admiration.

"Were you responsible for this!" She seethed at James, barely able to stop herself from strangling him.

"Yes," he said, no sign of compunction in his voice or face.

"Dumbledore," Lily said, turning to him. "Do something, punish him, them, punish all of them."

"Lily, I'm your boyfriend," said James.

"Yeah," said Sirius, "and I'm your boyfriend's best friend"

"You ruined picture day," she hissed, glaring at them as if she were trying to kill them with the power of her mind.

Dumbledore cleared his throat. "Ms. Evens, I will handle this." His voice was back to its normal volume. "Mr. Potter, Mr. Black, did you transform all of this candy into mice and set them on the great hall?"

"Yes," said James, "and it worked out wonderfully, I wasn't sure if the mass transfiguration spell would work for such a large number, but it worked fine." As he said this he surveyed the scattered candy with a certain amount of pride.

"Yeah," said Sirius, "I've never transformed so many thousands before, and from candy at that, but it worked beautifully if I do say so myself."

The two boys grinned at each other, impressed by their own cleverness.

Dumbledore struggled to hide a grin, the things some students came up with.

"Well," said Dumbledore, "as punishment I am sentencing you to clean up all of this candy."

"That's it!" cried Lily, aghast that such a crime as ruining picture day should be so lightly punished. "They ruined picture day, mice got into all the film and now everything is filled with candy, not to mention the photographer ran off screaming because he's deathly afraid of white rodents!"

"Yes, I suppose I could do something else, they did, after all, stampede thousands of mice made from transfigured Skittles through the great hall. I believe that each of you should earn twenty points for Gryffindor, for such a fine piece of magic."

James and Sirius looked at each other and said, "Yes!" in the same moment.

Lily was furious, the Marauders got away with murder once again.

"So, boys, time to clean up," Dumbledore said, and with that he swept out of the hall.

* * *

The clean up took hardly any time at all, and more importantly picture day was postponed for two weeks. In that time Remus would be back to full functioning and, in Sirius' words, "No longer look like crap."

When picture day rolled around for real this time it went off without a hitch. Lily complained that it was not nearly as nice a day as last time, but nobody else could tell the difference. Everyone had their pictures taken, their quotes taken down, and everything went smoothly.

When the yearbooks came out on graduation day and all of the seventh years were presented with their final yearbook the Marauders eagerly flipped through the pages in order to find their entry. Sirius was in the first few pages of the seventh year section of the book. As always he looked excellent. James and Peter were on the same page, each of them looking as cool as possible. And Remus, there in the 'L' section finally had a yearbook photo that looked good. It turned out that good friends can make life just a little more fair after all.


End file.
